


What Kind of a Place is Sakaar

by ifitwasribald



Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: F/M, Post-Thor: Ragnarok (2017)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-23
Updated: 2017-12-23
Packaged: 2019-02-19 06:54:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,954
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13118406
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ifitwasribald/pseuds/ifitwasribald
Summary: After the events of Ragnarok, Bruce and Valkyrie talk.





	What Kind of a Place is Sakaar

It was the window that gave it away. 

The room Bruce found himself in could have been anywhere--the aesthetic was on the industrial side, but it could easily have been any number of places on Earth. 

The window, on the other hand, opened onto a vast abyss of nothing, sprinkled through with stars in patterns no Earth-dweller had ever seen. 

That was okay. 

That was definitely okay and no reason to panic, because at least he wasn't on a planet crowded with aliens clamoring for the Hulk, or attempting to fly a ship the likes of which he'd never seen, or laid out flat before a creature out of nightmares he'd never had. At least he was himself, back in the driver’s seat of his own mind--something he'd only moments ago resigned to relinquish forever. 

Or maybe not moments ago. Probably not. The thought wormed through his guts, leaving his skin clammier than it had been before. Maybe it had been days, months. Years. 

He cast around the room for any clue, but found none. 

He did find clothes. Not the suit jacket and too-tight pants--those must have perished when he'd jumped into the fray on Asgard--but something simpler, and looser. Asgardian, he supposed.

He put them on and padded barefoot to the door, which opened at the press of his hand.

Outside was another room, mercifully without windows this time. There were seats, and a side table. Bruce's stomach rumbled at the sight of something bread-like, and what appeared to be fruit. 

He picked up the bread and sniffed at it. There wasn't any particular reason that anything here should be edible for a human, but it smelled like food, and in his particular situation there wasn't a lot to worry about. He took a bite, chewed, swallowed. Did it again, not quite sure what else one should do when awakened from the control of his other self on a spaceship in the middle of who-knows-where.

His hunger was beginning to subside when another door opened, and Valkyrie strode in. She gave him a cursory glance as she made her way over to the sideboard and poured herself a drink from one of a number of decanters. She picked up the glass, tipped it back, and drained the amber liquid in a single swallow, before pouring herself another in what seemed like the same smooth motion. He found himself admiring her grace with an interest that was almost certainly entirely inappropriate.

Only with the second drink in hand did her attention turn to him. "So. You're back."

Bruce shrugged his agreement.

"Why?"

He shrugged again. "I really don't know. What did he-- what happened?"

Her gaze hardened, and she took another long drink before answering. "Asgard is lost."

Bruce looked down at his hands. He had, he realized, been hoping, assuming even, that they had won. That his decision to allow the Other Guy back out of his skin might have been enough. In the midst of gods and monsters at least his equal, he should have known better. "I'm sorry."

It seemed like the response she had hoped for. "Its people are saved. Thor thinks that's enough."

"Oh." The response felt inadequate, but he couldn't come up with another. "And where are we going now?"

"Earth."

"Oh," he said again. That was good news, he supposed. Earth was the Avengers. Earth was home. But as he tried to fathom the disappointment that welled inside him, he realized that he was no more certain what he would do on Earth than on this ship.

"You don't look happy to be going home."

He shook his head. "No. Earth is good," he told her, however unconvinced he might be. "I just, uh-- It'll be an adjustment."

She picked up a fresh glass, poured a golden liquid into it, and held it out to him, the curve of her lips almost sympathetic.

He took the glass and brought it to his own lips almost without thinking. His first sip burned down his throat with a warming glow far more potent than whisky, but more tempting than he'd usually found alcohol to be. Then again, circumstances being what they were, a man could be forgiven for really wanting a drink. He took a larger swallow.

He looked up to see that she was watching. Her face had relaxed into an actual grin, which dropped away as his eyes met hers.

She picked up the decanter to pour herself another drink, then thought better of it and took the bottle with her to a low bench, where she arranged herself comfortably.

Bruce took his own glass, still more than half full, over to a seat and settled himself, not entirely sure what to do next and happy enough, if those were the right words, to spend a little time enjoying his drink, and not thinking too much about anything else.

“So you don’t remember, what happens when you’re--”

“The Other Guy?” He shook his head. “No. Not usually.”

“Well, for the record, I prefer him.” She smiled, as if it were a joke, but he knew better.

“Seems like most people around here do,” he agreed.

They drank in silence until curiosity got the better of Bruce.

"You knew him." It was sort of a question.

"Yeah," she agreed.

"What was--" He wasn't entirely sure how to ask what he wanted to know. "What was he doing there? On Sakaar?"

She shrugged. "I found you--him--like the others. That's how it is on Sakaar. People just fall out of the sky. And then there they are."

"Is that how you got there?"

"More or less." She took another, longer drink, and on taking in her expression, Bruce declined to interrupt.

The glow of the alcohol burned through his veins, and he realized that it was far more than he'd allowed himself in years. Then again, the risks here didn't seem to be quite what they were on Earth. Maybe he could afford to relax a little. He took another swallow, enjoying the daring of it as much as the buzz.

"What did he do," Bruce finally asked, "after you found him?"

"He competed. Won, a lot."

Bruce remembered the signs, the riotous celebration of the Other Guy on that alien street. "Yeah. I gathered that. What--" He cut himself off, shook his head. He already knew what the game had been. The Other Guy couldn't play any other kind. "The competition, it wasn't exactly voluntary, was it?"

She shook her head and looked away. She didn't look interested in apologizing for whatever part she'd played in the Grandmaster's twisted games, but he knew guilt, and he saw it on her face.

"How many?"

Her gaze snapped back to him, the guilt papered over with anger. “What does it matter?” She took a very long swallow. “Sakaar… Sakaar’s its own kind of place. It’s not like Asgard.”

Her expression turned dark with memory, and Bruce let his gaze drop to the glass in his hand. It was still almost half full, but he was starting to feel loose and easy, as if it had been much more. Which it probably was. Come to think of it, he had no particular reason to believe it was even ethanol, though the effects felt much the same.

He looked around the room, wondering if he should leave her to her thoughts, but he had no idea where to go, and wasn’t eager to go exploring.

Not long passed before the buzz of whatever had been in his glass led him to speak again. "What did you like about him?" 

"He was a good sparring partner."

Bruce frowned. "He doesn't spar."

"He does, actually."

He shook his head. Somehow among spaceships and space vikings and actual, functioning Eisenstein-Rosen bridges, the idea of the Other Guy sparing was the one it was beyond him to accept. "He's nothing but rage. He doesn't-- he can't spar, he can't play. He's-- he's not a person." His fingers were clenched around his glass, and he felt his chest tighten in a way that he himself understood was vastly disproportionate to the conversation. He looked up at her, instinct telling him that he'd see terror on her face.

Instead, she cocked her head to one side with a wry smile. "He seemed like a person to me. Not much of a conversationalist, I'll admit, but better than some I've known. He's got a great sense of humor."

"What? No, he--" Bruce found himself utterly unable to finish his own thought. "No," he finished instead. "He's only ever been-- destruction. He can be aimed, sometimes, but--” He shook his head.

“I don’t think you know him as well as you think you do.”

“I don’t need to know him. I know what he leaves behind.”

She took a long, slow pull from the bottle, draining the last third that had remained. When she spoke, he could hear the effects of the alcohol for the first time. “Is that all a person is?”

His first impulse was to wonder why she would defend the Other Guy so vociferously, but almost immediately he realized his mistake. She wasn’t talking about him at all. “No,” he conceded. “But the Hu-- the Other Guy, I don’t know what else he could be.”

She shrugged. “In a place like Sakaar-- at least the Hulk is who he is. No pretenses. It’s not a bad way to be.”

“What do you mean, a place like Sakaar?” She cocked her head at him, and for some reason he felt the need to justify his own ignorance. “It was my first time on another planet, and I didn’t have a lot of time to get an impression.”

She turned away from him and stalked over to the sideboard, grabbing a fresh bottle. “Nobody goes there on purpose.” She passed his seat on the way back to her own and, without breaking stride, refilled his glass. “It’s a place for the garbage of the universe. The people who don’t belong anywhere else anymore. So you--” she shrugged, settling gracefully back into her chair. “You do what you have to to make a life. Even if it isn’t a good one.” 

The bitterness on her face as she brought the bottle back to her lips was like watching his own reflection. Whether because of that or in spite of it, Bruce wished he could chase the guilt away. “There’s a lot to be said for staying alive. You were there for your people when they needed you.”

“For all the good it did them.”

“Hey, I wasn’t there--” He saw an objection forming on her lips, and waved it away. “He was there. Not me. But anyway, I saw what you could do on Sakaar, and whatever happened on Asgard, it was close, right?”

She nodded.

“Then whatever it took for you to be there--maybe it was worth it.”

Her face had softened, but when she laughed he could still hear the bitterness. “And that’s why you’re so fond of your other half?”

“It’s--” He stopped himself before he could say _it’s different_ because it was and it wasn’t. “What he’s done, it’s not so easy to forget.”

She held up her bottle with a little twist of a smile. “To forgetting.”

He looked down to his own glass and raised it up in a little toast, but he didn’t drink. “I’m not looking to forget. Just to… think about something else for a little while.”

She considered that, watching him with what he’d call interest if he were a more optimistic man. “And what do you do to pass the time?”

“On an alien spaceship who knows how far from Earth,” he gestured around, “apparently I get drunk with a beautiful woman. Who is actually an alien and can apparently spar with the Other Guy, so--”

He lost the train of thought as she put the bottle down and closed the space between them.

She placed a single finger over his lips as she moved to straddle his lap. "How about you stop talking now?"

Her lips tasted of whatever it was they'd both been drinking, and Bruce found himself more than content to let her tip his head back and deepen the kiss. The tight leather of her pants pressed firmly against him, and he could feel his pulse quicken.

He reached up with one tentative hand to caress her side, and she murmured something wordless and pleased. He felt her fingers slip into the waistband of his pants and start to tug them free.

All of a sudden he remembered himself and moved to push her away. At first his hands pressed against her with no effect at all--he'd forgotten, for a moment, what she was--but then she noticed his attempt and shifted away on her own.

"No?" She shook her head. "You Earth people must do things very differently, because you really seemed to--"

He shook his head. "It's, uh, not that I wouldn't like to. But when I-- things get a little blurry."

"What do you mean, blurry?" 

She still hadn't moved from his lap, and the press of her thighs to either side of his was more than a little distracting. He took a breath and tried to remind them both of them of the impossibility of his situation. "The Other Guy--the Hulk--he can bleed through, sometimes. When my heart rate gets too high, when I'm... less focused."

One eyebrow shot up and she smiled. "So?"

"So I can't. He-- You've seen what he can do."

Her smile broadened. "I have," she agreed with a leer.

A thought occurred to him, and it was almost enough to distract his body from the way hers felt above him. "You-- he-- You didn't."

She laughed. "No. Not for lack of trying. I'm not sure he's all that clear on the concept."

"But you-- tried?" His mind still boggled at the idea of the Other Guy existing as anything but blood and fury, let alone anything sexual.

"I suggested. A good sparring partner's usually good at other things too." Before he could object to that, she brought a hand up to the side of his head, her thumb running down over his temple and cheek. “But we've gotten off topic, and just when we were getting somewhere fun."

He let her kiss him again, let his body press up against hers, before caution reasserted itself. “I could hurt you.”

She threw her head back and laughed, the sound of it musical and tempting, even as it was also more than a little insulting. The hand on his cheek ran up and into his hair, where it clenched and pushed his head back, baring his throat. He felt her lips hot on his neck, and then a sharp shock of her teeth that set his nerves ablaze. His hips rocked up against her, and she chuckled against his skin. “That’s better.”

He caught those lips with his own and kissed her as caution fled before the strength of her body and the sound of her laugh. She made quick work of his pants and in a moment she had his cock firmly in her fist, stroking him hard enough that he clenched his hands on the arms of the chair and prayed not to spill right then.

He gasped in air when she released him, and she chuckled again as she wriggled out of her leather pants, and then all of a sudden he was deep inside the wet heat of her and all his thoughts dissolved into the pleasure of it.

It had been so long--so, so long--and he found himself lost in the sensations, thrusting up and into her while his hands grabbed at her sides, pulling her down onto him in time with his own rhythm. 

It was only when she murmured her approval with a throaty “more like it,” that he realized his grip was too sharp, the pull of his arms too strong. Fear shot through him and he looked up into her face, filled with a terrible certainty that he’d see pain there. But all he saw was pleasure--pleasure and a surly satisfaction that melted his fear away and let sheer animal desire take its place.

He pushed her up and off himself, some part of his mind noting that such a thing would have been impossible moments before, and then followed her motion as the two of them sprawled on the floor. He entered her again, thrusting into her body with a wild abandon he’d never before dared, He felt her legs wrap around his hips and her heels dig against his ass, prodding him to continue, to deepen his thrusts and quicken his pace.

“Like that, like that, just like that, fuck,” her voice hissed in his ear, and he buried his face against her throat and let himself revel in the pleasures of her body, and his own.

He was close, so close, when she hissed in a breath and grabbed at his hand, pulling it down between them to rub against her. She moaned her satisfaction and her legs clenched harder around him and then he was spilling, pleasure rippling through his body and into her.

After a long trembling moment he let himself collapse onto her, heart still pounding and gasping in air. She watched him, the twist of her smile softened with satisfaction.

“Still like him better?” he murmured against her skin.

She snorted out a laugh and pulled him up to her for another kiss. “Let’s call it a tie.”


End file.
